Heart failure
Movie: Valentine
Flesh-eating sequel is an improper diet
Movie: Hannibal
Save your breath
Movie: Saving Silverman
Heart failure
Movie: Valentine
Flesh-eating sequel is an improper diet
Movie: Hannibal
Save your breath
Movie: Saving Silverman
Acting saucy
It’s pretty amazing what’s happening on the west side of Winter Park. Avoiding for the moment the social and economic implications of the area’s growth, I’ll just say that on the dining front, we’re getting a lot more choices. Some choices didn’t work. The East India Market, an upscale and rather tony shop, has given…
Trying to make it explicit
In January, Nicholas Griffin, owner of video stores in York and Grimsby, England, was fined about $9,900 by a magistrates’ court under the Trade Descriptions Act for marketing ordinary feature films (such as the 1973 Jack Palance comedy “Secrets of a Sensuous Nurse”) as “hard-core” sex videos. Said Griffin, “I am amazed people have the…
Eye Drive: Money for nothing
When someone gives you an extravagant gift — like, say, $400 million — what’s the appropriate way to say “thank you”? An enormous box of chocolates? A really big Hallmark card? That’s the question that recently bedeviled executives at the Walt Disney Co. They wanted to show their appreciation to Compaq, the Houston-based computer corporation,…
Abortion doc’s denouement
Central Florida abortion provider Dr. James Pendergraft has been convicted in federal court of trying to extort millions of dollars from Marion County. Pendergraft, who owns five Florida abortion clinics, including two in Orlando, was found guilty based on comments he made while suing the county for not adequately protecting his newest clinic in Ocala…
Hood calls in a favor
Never let it be said that Mayor Glenda Hood isn’t connected. Or that she won’t pull whatever string necessary to save face. In the case of a flap over a Parramore charter school, a parochial issue if there ever was one, Hood appealed to the state’s highest-ranking executive, Jeb Bush. Hood contacted Bush because of…
Call off the ‘Search’
Last fall, a lot of us were brimming with hope for “In Search Of,” the myth-probing documentary series that was being produced in Orlando for broadcast on the Fox and USA TV networks. Executive producer Gregg Hale and his partners at Haxan Films had used the runaway success of their “The Blair Witch Project” to…
Hannibal Lecter: the early years
It’s no coincidence that Anchor Bay Entertainment has timed the release of “Manhunter,” in two VHS and two DVD versions, to coincide with the new film Hannibal. Although the reviews for “Manhunter” (1986) were uniformly good, the filmic introduction of nasty serial killer Hannibal Lecter was initially seen by very few people and eventually dwarfed…
A romantic dinner with little effort
If you haven’t made that Valentine’s Day reservation yet, there is another way to impress your sweetie. Head over to The Fresh Market (995 N. State Road 434, Altamonte Springs; 407-786-1801) and get the fixin’s for your own romantic dinner. Open with an appetizer of Carolina crab cakes. Try the phyllo-wrapped “chicken Paris” as a…
Backstreet babies
In the new world order of pop music’s machine, where artifice usurps sincerity to the beat of a drum machine, it’s hard to imagine anyone holding down a soul, much less a family. Take the dysfunction of the legendary Jacksons, where the toils of familial connection drained the pigment from Latoya and Michael, and rendered…
Springing to action
If the award-winning documentary “Wekiva: Legacy or Loss?” can’t move you to activism on behalf of Florida’s beleaguered wild places, nothing can. With awesome photography, shot partly in the Wekiva River’s dangerous, never-before-explored main spring, and a smart script by co-producer Bill Belleville, the film creates a mythical sense of place and an urgent sense…
Making a collective call
“Memories are great,” I heard Stephen Wright say on TV. “They’re the only things you have to look back on.” Memories are great, but the great ones pass so quickly you could get whiplash looking back on them. Jan. 20 was the best day I’ve had all year, but by the 22nd it felt like…
Rain, rain … Come again?
Orlando, naturally, can’t stand the grey areas, and the recent extended stint of clouds and spit make that point. Cabin fever begets sexual fervor. What’s a girl or boy to do when the skin blotches and the hair kinks here in the land of plastic plenty? We kink, too. Smut reigns supreme. Just ask porn…
Making waves makes its point
Rollins College students weren’t expecting a decision on the fate of their beloved radio station, WPRK, for several weeks. Instead, Steve Neilson, dean of student affairs, pulled eight of the station’s directors into his office Feb. 1 and gave them the news: After much angst, contention and debate, WPRK would remain an independent station, run…
The devil, you say?
When former Orange County Chairman Mel Martinez fled Central Florida to take his place in Resident Bush’s cabinet, an expectant light shone on Martinez’s successor, Richard T. Crotty. What sociopolitical philosophy would define Crotty’s tenure? Would he adhere to the established policy that “family entertainment” shall forever be the area’s image? A proposal advanced by…
